New year--old arguments? While the New Year is traditionally a time for clean slates and fresh starts, Switzerland's politicians are likely to be confronted in 2006 by many of the same issues that dominated the previous 12 months.

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POLITICS

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New year--old arguments? While the New Year is traditionally a time for clean slates and fresh starts, Switzerland's politicians are likely to be confronted in 2006 by many of the same issues that dominated the previous 12 months.

As a new parliamentary year gets underway, politicians from the Swiss left and their opponents on the right are united in one thing--they all agree on what they should be fighting about.

If the leftist Social Democratic Party and right-wing Swiss People's Party have their way, 2006 will once again be dominated by the topics that prevailed in 2005: government spending cuts, the proper treatment of foreigners, and Switzerland's future role in, or outside of, the European Union.

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